The Honor Scholars
by Circus Witch
Summary: It was weird enough seeing Candy Chiu as a possible love interest, but having her as an academic rival was worse. In his quest to be Valedictorian, Dipper has to juggle homework, extracurricular activities, family, and the town's mysteries while maintaining his sanity. (High School!AU)


**I write so much and publish so little lol.**

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The first day of school didn't feel the same in Gravity Falls. That wasn't to say the wonders of high school paled in comparison to the wonders of the deep forests-a statement like that would be a lie worse than the time Stan told the police Dr. Medicine prescribed a seeing-eye bear to drive him to the hospital. There were new mysteries from a different perspective.

Dipper and Mabel truly realized how _tiny_ the town really was once they received their schedules from the long line at orientation. Usually, teachers only taught what they had credentials for and didn't stray too far from their department. In Gravity Falls High, the same teachers either taught multiple subjects or the same one for every grade. It made for interestingly decorated classrooms. Wendy explained that the school had a low budget, the district was lazy, and grading wasn't hard in the first place with how small the class sizes were. Every class averaged ten to fifteen students.

With the staff spread so thin, it was impossible to accommodate for outliers who either caught onto information too slow or too fast. Students of that description were forced to seek alternatives, like tutoring, homeschooling, or online college classes. However, this year, local genius Stanford Pines's wallet went dry. Even one Ph. D made him overqualified as a high school teacher. Multiply that success rate by twelve and one could possibly get close to fathoming how happy the school was to accept him. The only problem was that he insisted on only teaching AP, not even Honors, and very few were ready for that challenge. Stanford taught straight from zero to seventh period. He was well-aware that he was being severely underpaid, but he was more concerned with the travesty that was the school's lack of AP courses.

As such, Dipper found his Grunkle's name listed as his teacher for a majority of his schedule. The only exception was his eccentric seventh period marching band teacher, Bill Cipher, a class which thankfully counted as P.E. credit. This class was also the only one he shared with Mabel. She was smart enough to _not_ commit social suicide with six AP classes, but hey, at least he was a shoe-in for valedictorian. She didn't play any instruments, but after tagging along with her brother to band camp, she discovered that she was killer with a flag (literally).

He started the morning off on the wrong foot. (It was the right foot, specifically. _Always_ step off on the left foot on count one.) He stepped in gum and attempting to scrape it off only made a worse mess on his shoe. The squish and stick of it bothered him on every other step. (He was counting his steps in sixes, now. Most marching bands used multiples of four or eight, but Mr. Cipher said teaching the marching technique based on multiples of three would be helpful when they learned the show.) That hindrance combined with his nosiness for peculiar rumors earned him the nickname "Gumshoe." It was a cool moniker and all, but really, he just wanted the gum off.

First period AP Physics would cheer him up, he hoped. He was already familiar with Ford's teaching style and was confident, come May, that he would pass all of his AP exams with at least a strong three.

Like every other class on campus, Stanford's classroom was jam-packed with references to the myriad of subjects he taught: posters of complex equations, detailed diagrams of the anatomy of endemic species, framed historical documents, shelves of classic literature, and many, many inventions and objects and plants labeled with warnings in all capital letters. The room itself was primarily intended for lab experiments.

Dipper took a seat on a stool next to the only person he knew and also the only other person in the classroom, Candy Chiu. They had most classes together, except for second period English, third period world history, and fifth period Spanish classes. He was only slightly guilty about it, but he was glad he didn't have every class with Candy. That would mean they would be neck-and-neck for valedictorian if they both got straight A's, but at least he knew he would be on good terms with the salutatorian. He took a glance at her schedule, only to find a distressing anomaly between what he expected and what he saw.

Apparently, Stan taught _Honors_ -one step above regular, one step below AP, but credited with the same amount of GPA points as AP and without specific preparation for the big exams in May. First period on the first day of school, and Dipper already felt cheated by the education system. "Does he even have the credentials to teach Honors?" Dipper questioned.

Candy smiled a smile sweeter than her name. It was sickeningly innocent, like a regretful day after Summerween spent over a toilet with sugar-coated vomit. "Did you know that Mr. Pines and Mr. Pines get paid the same for teaching at least three advanced courses?"

Dipper hated high school.


End file.
